Reuters
U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders addresses his first campaign rally after the Nevada Caucus in El Paso
- On Monday night, The Daily Beast published a story about a now-former Michigan field director for the Sanders campaign, who had sent many tweets mocking and degrading other candidates.
- The piece generated a lot of chatter on Twitter, led to the staffer being fired, and to the reporter being harassed by Sanders supporters, or those claiming to be Sanders supporters, online.
- On Monday night, Sanders was asked at a CNN town hall about the alleged behavior of his supporters, and he said that the majority of his supporters were "fantastic people," but condemned the "jerks" among them.
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After Scott Bixby, a national reporter at The Daily Beast, published an article exposing a staffer on Sen. Bernie Sanders' campaign for using degrading language about other candidates on a private Twitter account, Bixby was subjected to online harassment himself.
A regional field director in Michigan, Ben Mora, tweeted that Sen. Amy Klobuchar "looks like her name: pained, chunky, [and] confused origin/purpose," called Sen. Elizabeth Warren a "dumb Okie" and "an adult diaper fetishist," and disparaged her appearance. He also tweeted that former Mayor Pete Buttigieg "is what happens when the therapist botches the conversion."
Mora was fired soon after Bixby's story was published on Monday, according to the campaign's communications director, Mike Casca, who told the Beast, "We are running a multiracial, multigenerational campaign for justice where disgusting behavior and ugly personal attacks by our staff will not be tolerated."
Some prominent Sanders supporters spoke out to defend the campaign's decision to fire Mora.
"I am very sympathetic to anyone who faces career consequences for their online behavior, believe me," progressive journalist Dave Klion tweeted. "But I also think denigrating women's looks on a private burner account is something one could simply not do and should avoid doing."
But Bixby quickly became the subject of extensive online harassment from purported Sanders supporters. Bixby tweeted screenshots of thousands of text messages and voice mails he received in the hours after the story was published.
"Scott Bixby should literally be catapulted off the planet," one Twitter user wrote.
Another argued that The Daily Beast is in the tank for establishment Democrats and therefore fundamentally biased against Sanders and others on the left. Others accused Bixby of being personally biased against Sanders and his policies.
Several Twitter users published public records showing the price and location of an apartment they claimed was owned by Bixby, and critized the Daily Beast for its past Sanders coverage and for having Chelsea Clinton on its board of directors.
This all comes days after Sanders publicly condemned and distanced himself from online supporters, or so-called "Bernie Bros," who engage in harassment, including those who targeted the female leaders of Nevada's Culinary Union after the union criticized Sanders' Medicare for All plan.
During a CNN town hall on Monday night, Sanders again addressed the issue.
"I'm not going to tell you we don't have some jerks out there," Sanders said. "I do want to say to those folks: We do not want your support, if you think that what our campaign is about is making ugly attacks on other candidates. We don't want you."
This is super fun. pic.twitter.com/jrIRE3erv0
- Scott Bixby (@scottbix) February 25, 2020